Etymology Explorer › English

Where does “spooky” come from?

Spooky derives from English spook, from Dutch spook, from Middle Dutch spooc, with origins tracing through Latin suffixal elements -ia and -ivus back to Proto-Indo-European -kos.

spooky (English): Eerie, or suggestive of ghosts or the...

Definitions

  1. Eerie, or suggestive of ghosts or the...

Ancestry of “spooky”, step by step

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1English-yAdded to nouns and adjectives to form adjectives...
2Middle English-yDesignates an adjective, in many cases formed by...
3Old English-iġ-y, -ic
4Proto-West Germanic-gForms adjectives from nouns and verbs with a...
5Proto-Germanic-gaz-y
6Proto-Indo-European-ḱos-y, -ic

Words derived from “spooky”

  • spookily
  • spookiness
Every word from Proto-Indo-European -ḱos →